A journey through the intriguing history of colour

The recent publicationThe Secret Lives of Colour (John Murray, £20), tells the unusual stories and surprising histories of 75 dyes, shades and hues. Our Books Editor Rose Dahlsen interviews the book's author Kassia St Clair about some of her favourite shades and tips for working with colour.

What sparked your foray into the world of colour? I studied 18th-century women's fashions at Oxford for my masters degree - specifically what women wore to masquerade balls - and I discovered an entirely new and unfamiliar colour language. I would read diaries and letters describing clothes that would use terms like "hair brown" and "coquelicot", which I would then go away and investigate to try and find out exactly what they looked like. I remained fascinated after I finished my degree and pitched a column about individual shades to Elle Decoration in 2013 which has continued ever since. If the world was monochrome for a day, which colour would you most miss? What a brilliant question. It's tempting to say bright red, because I suppose that's the most vibrant, energetic hue, but I think it would be more likely to be green: I live near a park and take my dog for a walk every day, so I'd miss the greenery.

Davide Lovatti

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Do you have preferred colours for different rooms in your home? No I don't. Like everyone else I'm constantly influenced by colour trends. We're planning to redecorate this year and I've changed my mind about the colour scheme a hundred times. Currently I'm thinking the palest of satin pinks for the drawing room, with navy and Schiarparelli pink accents, with either a dark forest green or a duck egg on the kitchen cabinets. All this will have been revised completely by next month.

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Can you tell us some key facts about the 'secret lives' of a few shades - their 'fascinating, important or disturbing histories' that you describe in the book?

Ivory: For this one I looked at the ivory trade over the past centuries, which has so devastated the elephant populations. One of my earliest memories is of a gold WWF membership coin my mother gave me with an elephant on it. I was delighted by the recent news that China are finally cracking down on ivory: if it's done fast enough, elephant numbers might stabilise again. Chrome yellow: A couple of years ago there was a brilliant exhibition on in Amsterdam looking at the work of Munch and Van Gogh and I got a chance to see one of the latter's sunflower paintings. I was fascinated to learn how much it had darkened since it had been painted - because the chrome yellow Van Gogh used had reacted with the light. This makes the painting seem rather disturbing, particularly in view of what we know about his mental state towards the end of his life. But in fact we know from his letters that these paintings were done in a spirit of excitement and optimism, as a kind of gift for Gauguin.

Paul Massey

Dutch orange: Although I studied early-modern history somehow that of the Orange dynasty was relatively unfamiliar to me. I loved looking at all the portraits of the family - it was an amazing time in clothing history. In so many of them the head of the family is depicted in shades of orange so they were clearly aware of the power of their name in creating a visual identity for themselves. Shocking pink: I've already mentioned Schiaparelli pink here, and I will happily admit to having a fascination both with Elsa Schiaparelli, the Surrealist designer, and her signature hue. (Her autobiography, which is a wonderful work of fiction, is great fun to read.) I used to hate pink: I was made to wear it a lot when I was little and I've always resented the way it is so often shoved down my throat as a woman (this is still a problem now, particularly for sports brands). But my feelings towards it have changed the more I've studied and learnt about it. Shocking pink is a good entry level for women like me: it has attitude and is fun and playful and fearless, rather like Elsa Schiaparelli.

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Ultramarine: This was the colour story that I told people who tried to talk me out of writing the book. The sheer effort artists had to go to in order to put ultramarine pigment to canvas is astounding. Not only did it have to come all the way from northeastern Afghanistan, by way of the Silk Road, but it was also very difficult to grind down and purify into a usable paint. It's also the most glorious colour. I defy anyone to visit the National Gallery to see the way it is used in Sassoferrato's 'Virgin in Prayer' and not be completely mesmerised. Emerald: Emerald was one of the final colours I wrote in the book and it didn't take the shape that I thought it would. Some of the colours were like that: I though I would write one story and then, upon doing a bit more research, another would reveal itself. In the case of Emerald, the piece turned out to be about an improbable caper involving a double jaguar attack, a fake Ebay sale, a series of crooks and the world's largest emerald. It would make a marvellous film. Charcoal: The black chapter was a revelation to me: it was so much more interesting and gripping than I thought it would be. Charcoal was wonderful and a little sad. I wrote about the 19th-century discovery by a little girl of some incredible Paleolithic cave drawings at Altamira. The problem was that the scientific community thought, without bothering to go and look at the cave, that the drawings were fake. They admitted they were wrong, but only after the man they had accused of creating the intricate charcoal drawings of bison had died in disgrace. Do you have an example of a favourite interior or painting or film that really makes a shade sing? One of my favourite films is House of Flying Daggers: the use of colour in it, particularly in the early echo-dancing scene, is extraordinary. What is the worst thing we can do when working with colours in interiors, e.g. colour clashes? As a general rule, I hate rules. There are always exceptions, and if you like the use of two or more colours together and think they look good then I believe you should go ahead and use them, no matter what received opinion on the combination is. Perhaps something to be aware of, though, are cultural associations. Putting strong red and green hues together will always remind Westerners of Christmas, for example. Another thing to bear in mind is the use you'll be putting a room to and the mood you want to create there. I personally wouldn't use a great deal of a sinus-singeing mustard shade in my bedroom for example, because I wouldn't find it relaxing. Are you faithful to favourite colours, or do they change with seasons, settings and moods? Unrepentantly unfaithful I'm afraid.Are there any colours that generate a physical response, like a sickly green, happy yellow or passionate red? Scientists have demonstrated some odd responses between colours and physical responses. Baker-Miller pink, for example, was shown to have a calming effect, while red has been shown to make people more impulsive and prone to displays of dominance. There was even a study that showed that men were more likely to give waitresses wearing red bigger tips.